Condemned by History is a problem trope for many reasons. It leads to edit warring and confusion over what qualifies. In this thread we'll look for bad examples, and look for feedback. Here are the guidelines for this trope:
- The franchise has to be truly popular and loved at first. Things that are So Bad, It's Horrible don't count.
- Simply losing popularity isn't enough. We need to see an actual backlash, with liking it being considered bizarre. Otherwise, every not-so-famous film or concluded television series would be here.
Let's go!
Edited by GastonRabbit on Mar 16th 2024 at 4:23:01 AM
Honestly, I'm tempted to say Nostalgia Filter, since it's mostly looking back on a thing that's in the past and focusing on the good parts. Although that's an in-work trope, not for real life.
Recent addition:
- Despite all of its success, critical acclaim and influence, Murphy Brown just disappeared completely after the final episode aired in 1998. It failed to find any kind of meaningful life in syndication, the entire series has never been released to DVD because the initial DVD releases sold poorly, and the show overall just became completely forgotten about until the 2018 revival - and it bombing seemed to reinforce the point that the public had lost all interest in Murphy Brown. Really, Murphy Brown relying so heavily on topical humor and making fun of the news of the week really hurt it as it aged and made it difficult to re-run. Additionally, its niche was quickly taken over by The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, which premiered in 1999 and better utilized Murphy Brown's style of topical humor for the internet age.
"Disappeared completely" =/= Condemned by History. This is not the first time this show has been added and subsequently removed, either. Permission to cut?
EDIT: I was wrong.
Edited by themayorofsimpleton on Jul 16th 2021 at 2:39:08 PM
Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper WallDid the same person add that show back in?
Also, people not being interested or the show being unpopular =/= hated.
Edited by PlasmaPower on Jul 16th 2021 at 3:22:14 PM
Thomas fans needed! Come join me in the the show's cleanup thread!
OK apparently it wasn't added back in. Maybe I'm just confusing it with something else that got chopped long, long ago. I apologize.
A while ago, I posited returning Oreimo to the page since the criteria were loosened, and I was told that it could be possible. Here is my draft for that entry. Feel free to tell me what you think.
Series
- Oreimo was an absolute phenomenon in the late 2000s and early 2010s, as it was one of the first light novels to combine a traditional Harem Genre story with characters and stories that examined otaku culture and media tropes. Fans loved being able to read about characters that shared their own interests, and the anime adaptation exposed the source material to an even bigger number of fans. However, several key issues began to propagate through the story that would ultimately lead to its downfall: the first is the slice of life and otaku-centric content being put on the back burner for increasingly intrusive harem shenanigans, the anime increasing Kirino's bad behavior while still treating her as a primary love interest for the protagonist, sidelining and derailing fan-favorite characters, and an ending which saw Kyousuke seemingly alienating all the other girls to turn the Incest Subtext into outright text. The final nail in the coffin which cemented the backlash was the sheer amount of Follow the Leader light novels in the next few years. These would copy the extremely controversial Brother–Sister Incest plot of Oreimo to a shameless degree, as even works which were explicitly not about that kind of relationship would still throw in a Bratty Half-Pint little sister of the male protagonist seemingly for no other reason but Pandering to the Base. The second aspect of Follow the Leader was otaku-aimed works copying Oreimo's meta commentary, which quickly degraded from actual observations of otaku media and culture into simply pointing out media cliches while still indulging in them. Ironically, even the original author of Oreimo would fall victim to the backlash years later, when his follow-up work Eromanga Sensei was adapted to anime and quickly panned; most reviews noted that it took all the flaws that had been present in Oreimo and cranked them up to an intolerable degree. To this day, the first and often only thing anime fans could tell you about Oreimo is that it's the show where the protagonist breaks up with his girlfriend to get into a relationship with his sister.
I've been thinking about other examples of anime that could go on this page; the only one I've been able to come with that seems like it would really fit is Akame ga Kill!. Studio Deen's version of Fate/stay night could possibly count, although I'm not sure whether it truly fits this or just a case of "Seinfeld" Is Unfunny. Likewise, ERASED could possibly be a candidate for this page, but I'm not sure whether that actually qualifies or is just an ongoing case of Ending Aversion.
Some other, non-anime examples of Condemned by History I'd like to add to the sports section of the page are Buschwhacking (where NASCAR Cup series drivers would go down to lower levels of competition to compete; this was explicitly banned recently and is widely seen as an embarrassing case of the sport favoring big names over developing the young talent that actually need it), and Antonio Margarito (a boxer who got caught cheating and ended up permanently disgraced, with few willing to even consider his legitimate talent that got him there in the first place). Let me know if those are okay.
Edited by chucknormie on Jul 16th 2021 at 4:28:33 AM
"Blowing it up always works" -RIP Goblin Boommaster, 2014-2015
The proposed Oreimo entry looks good to me, if a bit long. Not sure how you'd be able to condense it while still getting the main points in, though.
Regarding Erased, I don't think it fully fits this trope. The worst I've heard about the anime is in regards to its super-condensed ending. Maybe there are some fans of the manga who dislike how it adapted other aspects of the source material, but the ending takes up more of the conversation by far.
(Admittedly, I don't keep as close a pulse on the anime community as others do, so it's possible that it's being condemned more than I think it is.)
Edited by Oratel on Jul 16th 2021 at 5:05:21 AM
It's a really gory show with ridiculous villain characters and a death count of nearly every named character. It was mainly popular among teenagers but suffered from Critical Dissonance. The anime was top-rated until it killed off everyone at the end. Then the manga did the same thing, killing off everyone except two of the biggest Scrappies. This led to backlash, and today I widely see it referred to as something that was one of the worst examples of "edginess"- something that was as gratuitously gory and graphic as any of the worst titles of The Dark Age Of Comic Books, and something that's very hard to view now without at least being a little disgusted. Admittedly, this is mainly the opinion of the places I hang out in, so I'm not sure if it's universal over the entire anime fandom.
The only place I ever really heard about Akame ga Kill was actually this very forum's Complete Monster clean-up thread - but within that admittedly super-specific sampling there was always something of a running gag about it being excessively edgy. Your saying it was mostly popular with teenagers specifically also sort of makes me wonder whether there was always an element that saw it as unsavory or in more critical terms.
Do you think Harry Potter counts as Condemned by History? It shaped the landscape of children's literature and had a huge influence on early internet fandom culture, but over the years, people have become more critical of it as the author's... views have come to light.
No, I still enjoy it. In fact, the Harry potter memes are still strong in Facebook, and these are fan memes, not hatedom memes about JJKR transphobia.
At best, it's just "Seinfeld" Is Unfunny.
To win, you need to adapt, and to adapt, you need to be able to laugh away all the restraints. Everything holding you back.I'd want to see some in-depth analysis of the popularity of the books before listing it here. One problem with such controversies is that the involved parties often have Opinion Myopia and overestimate how much their opinion is shared in the wider world.
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard FeynmanHarry Potter definitely isn't Condemned by History. One could make the case for J. K. Rowling being a Fallen Creator, though.
Keet cleanupYeah, I was surprised when I checked Fallen Creator last year and she wasn't on there.
Potter is not Condemned by History. They literally just opened a Harry Potter store in New York City not too long ago. I've seen people on Reddit as well say that the work itself is not bad, but the author is. I think it's seen as another "love the art, hate the artist" case like John Kricfalusi or Ariel Pink.
Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper WallSpeaking off is John's entry on condemned correct use of this trope?
This trope requires that people retroactively view the old work as bad. I don't think that's occurred.
Wouldn't Fallen Creator fit better.
Edited by miraculous on Jul 17th 2021 at 11:52:01 AM
"That's right mortal. By channeling my divine rage into power, I have forged a new instrument in which to destroy you."

Would it fit anywhere else then? The entry says its popularity has come back in recent years, so it isn't Condemned by History.
Works That Require Cleanup of Complaining | Troper Wall